Posts, June 2003:

Blessed be the Ministry of Culture: The Norwegian Ministry of Culture reaffirmed its indirect control over the broadcast media last December, when it denied renewal of Radio P4's concession, which will expire at the end of 2003, to run the only commercial and national radio channel [...]

That's, like, so 1984!: What has Orwell wrought? Jenny Bull Tuhus in Dagbladet joins the ranks of the Orwell-abusers: It is one houndred years since George Orwell was born. That is a poor reason to read him again. September 11, 2001, however, is a [...]

The legitimate goals of terrorism: Former Imam at the Islamic Association in Oslo, Basim Ghozlan, demonstrates the wrong way to fight Islamic radicalism in this article in Aftenposten on the wrong way to fight terrorism, (via Kim Møller): The superpowers are making a misjudgment when [...]

Every statistic is doing you harm: The Norwegian Health Department celebrated the new year with a distasteful and patronizing media campaign against smoking, borrowing a concept from the evil Australians. Now, they're happy to announce, the results are in. It worked. Gruesome photos showing everything from [...]

Who but a racist: Local elections are coming up in the fall, and the Norwegian Centre Against Ethnic Discrimination (SMED), (a government-appointed organization that provides legal aid in discrimination cases) is circulating a petition it has asked all the political parties to sign. Among [...]

Eight activists, a truck and a phone call: How does one get ones face on TV? To those of you out there with good and worthy causes who have asked yourself this question, I am happy to now finally be able to reveal the answer: All you need [...]

Newspaper death: To preserve the diversity of the Norwegian press, a large number of local and so-called "opinion carrying" (ie. ideological) newspapers are subsidized by the state. I'm not sure what diversity this is meant to preserve, diversity of newspaper logos, perhaps. [...]

The spirit of 1951: What happened to the days of short, concise constitutions? I wanted to read the new draft for a EU constitution, but the damn thing is 72 pages long. I'll settle with quoting Article I-3 about the Union's objectives for now, [...]

Putting grandma out on bid: Gro Harlem Brundtland, former prime minister and Labor leader, loves her 84 year old mother. She loves her mother so much that she has hired a nurse to assist her at the publicly owned (and privately run) elderly care home [...]

Pilger, Fisk, Moore: Parallell universe moment on state-owned NRK radio this morning. First John Pilger, interviewed in connection with receiving the Sofie-price in Oslo yesterday, talking about how the American thousand year empire would soon meet a full stop, just like some other [...]

The Polish referendum: An overwhelming majority of the Poles voted to join the EU this weekend. With Eastern European EU referendums lined up at regular intervals throughout the year, a premature renewal of the Norwegian EU debate seems likely. Labor leader Jens Stoltenberg [...]

Review - Blood tracks: Norwegians who insist that the Americans brought September 11 on themselves, that the CIA created, then lost control of, Osama bin Laden - and there are quite a few who believe this - should read Torbjørn Knutsens recent book Blodspor [...]

Qaeda attack on Norway averted: The Norwegian embassy in Ethiopia was closed last week, citing fears of a terrorist attack. The fears were, apparently, well grounded - an attack by al-Qaeda may have been just barely averted [eng]: Terrorists based in Ethiopia planned an attack [...]

Hamas leader escapes, peace in danger: A year ago, I linked to an interview with Hamas leader Abd al-Aziz Rantisi, by Line Fransson in Dagbladet. Fransson is one of Dagbladet's most pro-Arab reporters, the kind who refers to Hamas leaders as "terrorists", and takes cute pictures [...]

Finder's keeper: The second Wolfowitz misquote, the one where he confirmed everyone's deepest fears about the US, ("we invaded Iraq .. for .. its oil .. and .. yes .. we .. sacrifice .. small children .. in the White House"), went [...]

Stupid, Stupid Rat Creatures: The big, bearded face of Michael Moore is smiling at me everywhere these days, inviting me to join his army of smug, ignorant factoid-Kalashnikovs. The major bookstores in Oslo have fairly good and broad selections on politics and history, (which [...]

Danish solidarity: Here's a good response to the missing wmd's: The Prime Minister of Denmark, Anders Fogh Rasmussen, who wholeheartedly supported the war on Iraq, explains that, other reasons aside, he felt obligated to aid the US to repay old debts: The [...]